Rainbow of Light appears over the Statue of Saint Joseph just before the procession on his Feast Day of Saint Joseph the Worker.

He has a name written on his cloak and on his thigh, “King of kings and Lord of lords.” Revelation 19:16

I have been blessed these past few weeks to still have the opportunity to go to adoration and confession and even was able to go to a Procession for the Feast of Saint Joseph the Worker. A Consecration was made not only to Mary Mother of the Church, but to the whole Holy Family.

During this time period I have also gone to confession frequently not out of scrupulosity but because I no longer have daily Mass where my venial sins are forgiven at the beginning and I receive the grace of the Eucharist, so instead I receive the grace from the Sacrament of Confession. Reconciling myself to God and the church, allowing God to lift me out of sin, even small ones.

I want to share a couple of things today. The first is about a miracle I experienced. Now normally I may not share something like this for various reasons, but because these are extraordinary times we are living in I believe we need to hear about miracles.

Our Padre Pio Nashville Prayer Group has had to meet online, just like most of you all out there during this virus. We always meet on the First Saturday of the month. This Saturday I went to adoration and prayed with all my heart. The Lord spoke to me a lot mostly about the Eucharist. I will also share about that. When I came home I got a really bad headache. I have never been one who has been prone to migraines, but I have had a couple in my life, and I would call this a migraine. It was the kind that makes you feel sick. I decided to lay down.

As I laid down I offered my headache to the Lord for three things. The first was for a Priest I know, the second for the conversion of someone, and finally for the Spiritual Children of Padre Pio in my prayer group because I would be missing the online meeting. I soon fell asleep. I was awakened by the singing of Ave Maria. At first I thought someone must have turned on the radio, but as I looked around, there was no device playing music. And this was the most beautiful singing, like nothing I had ever heard before. I realized it was inside my head – not in the way you may recall a song – but real live music. And the only word I can use to describe it is heavenly. I didn’t want it to stop. It played for maybe 60 seconds and when it did stop I was sad, I didn’t want to let it go. My headache was gone without a trace. I cannot really explain it. I found out later that the Padre Pio prayer group was singing Ave Maria online with one another. The only thing I can think is that the angels were singing with them. I have no other explanation except to say that God is good.

This experience got me too thinking about reparation. In deliverance ministry we often ask the question, “who is your Lord?” We ask this to teach people whose kingdom they are serving. Jansen has likened it to a landlord. If Jesus is your Lord then he owns your building. If something breaks, we can call the building owner to come repair it. But when we are steeped in sin we have handed ownership to Satan. Satan doesn’t want to repair, he wants to destroy, so our building crumbles.

When we continually sin with no effort to stop, no effort to examine, we have picked a different lord than the one who came to save us. If you proclaim Jesus is Lord, your actions should reflect that.

In today’s reading about the Good Shepherd we hear about how the Shepherd enters through the gate, but the thief climbs over elsewhere and doesn’t enter through the gate. The gates of our hearts are respected, and Jesus our Lord is a gentleman. He would never force Himself onto our hearts. If we know the Shepherd’s voice, which is done through prayer, we willingly let Him in. We willingly make Him our Lord. The thief attacks and forces his way in. He comes only to steal our hearts, kill our spirit and destroy our lives by taking ownership of what is was given to us as a gift by our true Lord.

Prayer is how we know the Shepherd and his voice. The Sacraments are how the Good Shepherd feeds us and nourishes us through grace. Sacred Scripture is how He protects us and leads us to pasture.

Jesus came to pay our debt because our land was stolen, our dominion was stolen. We can partake in helping to pay through reparation. Jesus is always calling us to cooperate with him in love. Calling us to lift out of sin and help others do the same.

During our Saint Joseph Procession, an act of reparation was made using the prayer of Pius XI from May 8, 1928 in the encyclical called Miserentissimus Redemptor.

We would all do well to be making reparation, especially now, during this pandemic, because here’s the thing, many many of us have been receiving the Eucharist unworthily without even thinking about it. But Saint Paul warns us of this. It amazes me that this passage was removed from the lectionary cycle.

For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord until he comes. Therefore whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord unworthily will have to answer for the body and blood of the Lord. A person should examine himself, and so eat the bread and drink the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body, eats and drinks judgment on himself. That is why many among you are ill and infirm, and a considerable number are dying. 1 Corinthians 11:26-30

I wonder what Mass will look like when we go back? Will we be striving to purge sin, to make reparation? to be reverent? or will it look like something we don’t recognize?

It has always been about making us pure, by recognizing the Good Shepherd, who we can cooperate with His Love to repair the damage that has been done. We have a God that became vulnerable and placed Himself in our control through both the incarnation and by allowing Himself to be crucified on a Cross. So when it comes to the Eucharist we can treat Him as we would an infant, the Divine Child – and thus become like little children ourselves – pure, or we can treat Him like they did Christ on the Cross. The first is the Image and Likeness of God, the second the abomination of sin. In both cases He is loving us but how we respond to His love teaches us who we are and how we love. Reverence for the Eucharist is all about true love. And because the Good Shepherd is my Lord, I want to proclaim it to the world with reverence and awe.

Peace be with you all. Stay safe out there.

Prayer of Reparation

O sweetest Jesus, whose overflowing charity towards men is most ungratefully repaid by such great forgetfulness, neglect and contempt, see, prostrate before Thy altars, we strive by special honor to make amends for the wicked coldness of men and the contumely with which Thy most loving Heart is everywhere treated.
At the same time, mindful of the fact that we too have sometimes not been free from unworthiness, and moved therefore with most vehement sorrow, in the first place we implore Thy mercy on us, being prepared by voluntary expiation to make amends for the sins we have ourselves committed, and also for the sins of those who wander far from the way of salvation, whether because, being obstinate in their unbelief, they refuse to follow Thee as their shepherd and leader, or because, spurning the promises of their Baptism, they have cast off the most sweet yoke of Thy law. We now endeavor to expiate all these lamentable crimes together, and it is also our purpose to make amends for each one of them severally: for the want of modesty in life and dress, for impurities, for so many snares set for the minds of the innocent, for the violation of feast days, for the horrid blasphemies against Thee and Thy saints, for the insults offered to Thy Vicar and to the priestly order, for the neglect of the Sacrament of Divine love or its profanation by horrible sacrileges, and lastly for the public sins of nations which resist the rights and the teaching authority of the Church which Thou hast instituted. Would that we could wash away these crimes with our own blood! And now, to make amends for the outrage offered to the Divine honor, we offer to Thee the same satisfaction which Thou didst once offer to Thy Father on the Cross and which Thou dost continually renew on our altars, we offer this conjoined with the expiations of the Virgin Mother and of all the Saints, and of all pious Christians, promising from our heart that so far as in us lies, with the help of Thy grace, we will make amends for our own past sins, and for the sins of others, and for the neglect of Thy boundless love, by firm faith, by a pure way of life, and by a perfect observance of the Gospel law, especially that of charity; we will also strive with all our strength to prevent injuries being offered to Thee, and gather as many as we can to become Thy followers. Receive, we beseech Thee, O most benign Jesus, by the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Reparatress, the voluntary homage of this expiation, and vouchsafe, by that great gift of final perseverance, to keep us most faithful until death in our duty and in Thy service, so that at length we may all come to that fatherland, where Thou with the Father and the Holy Ghost livest and reignest God for ever and ever. Amen.

9 Responses to Who is your Lord?

That ANYONE inside the Church “negotiating” with the State could suggest Take-Out Communion surely merits immediate and urgent REPARATION. I actually see a Spirit of Mockery operating at this present time. I am also noticing proposals that do in fact indicate a form of insanity, as we read here at the final comment. Example: This in today’s press…

According to La Stampa, an Italian daily, one of the solutions being considered is a “take-out” communion, because the distribution of the Eucharist is considered to have a “high contagion risk.” This proposal would see hosts placed in plastic bags to be consecrated by the priests and left on shelves for people to take.

“No, no, no,” Sarah told Nuova Bussola Quotidiana, an Italian conservative site, in an interview published Saturday. “It’s absolutely not possible, God deserves respect, you can’t put him in a bag. I don’t know who thought this absurdity, but if it is true that the deprivation of the Eucharist is certainly a suffering, one cannot negotiate how to receive communion. We receive communion in a dignified way, worthy of God who comes to us.”

“The Eucharist must be treated with faith, we cannot treat it as a trivial object, we are not in the supermarket,” Sarah said. “It’s totally insane. ”

I saw that. All of this is a mockery. We are expected to have virtual relationships instead of real ones. We have lost the Sacramental touch (no first communions or confirmations) and if we are in person we are expected to cover the face – the place where you look to know someone and have real relationship.

I just translated this awesome prayer today , composed in March 2020 by the Bishop of Vannes . It is being used and widely promoted in France because it is so very beautiful and complete. Thank you for sharing it . I had forgotten about it these past weeks and was strongly nudged this morning when I watched the live televised Mass at Saint Anne d’Auray in Brittany. Bishop Centene presided and at more than one moment , he appeared to be on the verge of tears. His homily was very prophetic and he says that because the Mass has become a “spectacle”, the Lord has withdrawn His Presence from our churches. Wow. First time I have heard a BISHOP say that. I will pray about translating the homily , too. In the meantime, here is his ACT of Spiritual Communion. Perhaps you would write a brief comment on the difference between a prayer and an act ? There is a shift in “intention”, it seems to me. Act of Contrition. Act of Faith. Act of Hope. Act of Love. Act of Spiritual Communion… are some major examples.

Here is the ACT OF SPIRITUAL COMMUNION:
Act of Spiritual Communion

Lord Jesus, I firmly believe that You are present in the Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist. I love you above all things and I desire You with all my soul. My body longs for you, like a parched land thirsts for water (Psalm 62) .

I desire to receive You today with all the love of the Virgin Mary, and with the joy and fervor of the saints.

I am not able to receive You sacramentally, come at least spiritually and visit my soul.

In this time of absence, may the Eucharistic fast to which I am presently bound, allow me to partake in Your sufferings and above all, in the sentiment of abandonment that You experienced upon the Cross when you cried out: “My God, my God why have you abandoned me?”

May this sacramental fast allow me to partake in the sentiments of Your Most Holy Mother and Saint Joseph, when they lost You in the temple at Jerusalem, and in the sentiments of Your Holy mother when she received You, lifeless, at the foot of the Cross.

May this Eucharistic fast allow me to partake in the sufferings of Your mystical Body, the Church, everywhere in the world where persecution or absence of priests have rendered all sacramental life impossible.

May this sacramental fast allow me to comprehend that the Eucharist is a superabundant gift of Your love, and not something owed to me in view of my spiritual comfort.

May this Eucharistic fast be in reparation for all the times that I have ever received You with an unprepared heart, with lukewarm indifference, without love and without thanksgiving.

May this sacramental fast deepen more and more my hunger to receive You, truly and substantially present Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity, when circumstances will once again permit it.

And until that time, Lord Jesus, come visit us spiritually by Your grace to strengthen us in our trials and tribulations.

That is sad. Some of ours were too. The Bishop left it up to each Pastor. Rejoice for those who can do these things because if they grow stronger it makes the whole Mystical Body stronger, including you. I felt Spiritually jealous at first of some people who I knew could still receive communion but the Lord told me to rejoice for them- if their light grows stronger it helps all of us.